You are the Mussolini of Microsoft: you have the engineering operations of Windows and Office running on time, smashing their reputation for lateness.You’ve run the $18bn Windows business unit for Microsoft, the world’s largest software company, and been in charge of the division building Office, the planet’s dominant personal productivity suite on the PC.

Your name was even starting to be dropped as a possible chief executive of Microsoft on the back of your latest creation, Windows 8. Yet after 23 years' of loyal service you suddenly find yourself without a job.What’s next?This is the question for Steven Sinofsky, who until Tuesday was the president of one of Microsoft’s biggest business units – Windows and Windows Live.If you believe Sinofsky, he’s not looking for a job right now: he’s taking a break between product cycles, a move he’s encouraged others to make.But no mentally functioning individual would, or should, believe this, given the importance of the work he was performing and his responsibilities inside Microsoft.It’s not like Sinofsky needs the work: his 2012 remuneration package was worth more than CEO Steve Ballmer's, amounting to $8.5m. This included $658,333 in salary, an $1.5m bonus and stock and other allocations